'British food' on Serious Eats

I first heard about Twiglets via France-based Graham Holliday (Noodlepie, Word of Mouth). This British expat journalist's Twiglet madness initially manifested itself on his blog, then spread to his Flickr account, and later to Twitter. It became severe enough that Holliday created a separate site devoted to these "crisps."... More

Like many food lovers, I was enthralled by Kim Severson's story on British chocolate bars in the New York Times. Severson tries to explain why British chocolate bars have a different taste from their U.S. counterparts. She concludes that it is a combination of slightly different ingredients and processing techniques. You've heard of terroir, which is, according to Wikipedia, a "French term in wine and coffee used to denote the special characteristics that geography bestowed upon them." Let's call what Severson reported "factoir," or the special characteristics that factories bestow upon chocolate bars. Even more interesting was the main story's taste-test sidebar, in which Severson concludes that "British chocolate bars do taste better." Not that we don't trust the... More